Law and Race Commons^™

Mapping Racial Capitalism: Implications For Law, Carmen G. Gonzalez, Athena D. Mutua

Journal Articles

The theory of racial capitalism offers insights into the relationship between class and race, providing both a structural and a historical account of the ways in which the two are linked in the global economy. Law plays an important role in this. This article sketches what we believe are two key structural features of racial capitalism: profit-making and race-making for the purpose of accumulating wealth and power. We understand profit-making as the extraction of surplus value or profits through processes of exploitation, expropriation, and expulsion, which are grounded in a politics of race-making. We understand race-making as including racial stratification, …

Identifying The Plessy Remainder: State Exploitation Of Private Discriminatory-Impact Actions, Matthew Patrick Shaw

South Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Race And Washington’S Criminal Justice System 2021: Report To The Washington Supreme Court, Task Force 2.0 Research Working Group

Seattle University Law Review

This report is an update on the 2011 Preliminary Report on Race and Washington’s Criminal Justice System. This update does not include as context the history of race discrimination in Washington, and readers are encouraged to view the 2011 report for its brief historical overview.14 The 2011 report began with that historical overview because the criminal justice system does not exist in a vacuum. Instead, it exists as part of a legal system that for decades actively managed and controlled where people could live, work, recreate, and even be buried.

Members of communities impacted by race disproportionality in Washington’s criminal …

Panel 1: Sexual Exploitation, Sex Workers, And Section 230, Mary Graw Leary, Kendra Albert, Carrie Goldberg, Felix Wu

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

The article examines the implications of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, focusing on its impact on sexual exploitation, sex workers, and online speech. Panelists discuss the unintended consequences of legislative changes like FOSTA-SESTA and propose reforms such as the EARN IT Act to address child sexual abuse material (CSAM). They emphasize the need to balance protecting victims with safeguarding legitimate speech, particularly for marginalized communities, and advocate for comprehensive reforms rather than piecemeal changes.

Hook, Line, And Sinker: The Use Of Subsidies, The Globalized System Of Preferences, And Arbitration To Save Our Ocean's Fish, Lindsy Maglich

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

In the wee hours of the morning, local fishermen from the impoverished West African country of Senegal head out to sea on their hand-hewn canoes, hoping to catch fish to bring home to sell for income. Thirty years ago these fishermen would bring in nets full of fish, yet these days the smaller local fisherman cannot compete with the Chinese megatrawlers sweeping their mile-long nets through the waters off of West Africa. Because Chinese fishing fleets have depleted the seas of fish near their home, China has sent 2,600 fishing vessels across the world to exploit the waters of other …

Fourth Amendment Issues And Covid-19 Tracking, Brooke A. Banks

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

The note argues that the special needs doctrine does not justify warrantless government access to cell site location information (CSLI) for COVID-19 tracking, as individual privacy interests outweigh public health benefits. It advocates for voluntary, privacy-protective measures, such as opt-in apps, to balance privacy and pandemic response.

Do The Safeguards In The Victorian Assisted-Dying Legislation Adequately Account For The Experiences Of Other Nations?, Heath Harley-Bellemore

Theses

In 2017 the Victorian State Parliament passed the Voluntary Assisted Dying Act 2017, making it the first Australian jurisdiction since 1996 to pass assisted dying legislation. The Victorian model was hailed by the Government of Victoria as the ‘safest and most conservative in the world’, and had the benefit of drawing on over 20 years of voluntary assisted dying experiences of other jurisdictions for its development. This thesis examines the experiences of other jurisdictions and how they informed the development of the Victorian model. It examines available data, reports, and criticisms of international experiences and applies them to the Victorian …

Whiteness As Guilt: Attacking Critical Race Theory To Redeem The Racial Contract, Marissa Jackson Sow

Law Faculty Publications

The year of racial justice awakening following George Floyd’s 2020 murder have been accompanied by a rise in attacks on Black thought, including Critical Race Theory, led by far-right activists who are invested in maintenance of a white supremacist status quo in the United States. This Essay uses artist Kara Walker’s 2014 Sugar Sphinx to contextualize the critiques on Critical Race Theory and other manifestations of Black intellectualism as a campaign for perpetual absolution of white guilt, and even redemption of white supremacy, that is openly embraced by white nationalists but also secretly nourished—and cherished—by the white liberal elite.

Criminal “Justice” As Racial Justice?, Aya Gruber

Publications

No abstract provided.

Human Rights At The Ocean-Climate Nexus: Opening Doors For The Participation Of Indigenous Peoples, Children And Youth, And Gender Diversity, Unwana Udo, Tahnee Prior, Sara L. Seck

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

No abstract provided.

Gender And Intersectionality In Business And Human Rights Scholarship, Melisa N. Handl, Sara L. Seck, Penelope Simons

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

In this article, we explore what intersectionality, as an analytic tool, can contribute to business and human rights (BHR) scholarship. To date, few BHR scholars have explicitly engaged in intersectional analysis. While gender analysis of BHR issues remains crucial to expose inequality in business activity, we argue that engagement with intersectionality can enrich and support this and other BHR scholarship. Intersectional approaches allow us to move beyond single-axis analysis, contest simplistic representations about gender issues and expose the complexity of human relations. It draws our attention to structures that sustain disadvantage such as racism, colonialism, social and economic marginalization and …

Race Belongs In Week One Of Lrw, Beth H. Wilensky

Articles

I talk to my 1Ls about race and the law in their first week of law school. In doing so, I have discovered that discussing race helps me introduce foundational concepts about legal writing and law school that we will return to throughout the year. That is partly because race is relevant to nearly every topic law school touches on. But it is also because race is present in—and often conspicuous in its absence from—court opinions in ways that provide rich fodder for discussing how to approach law school. That topic interests all students—even those who might be skeptical about …

The Social Psychology Of Inclusion: How Diversity Framing Shapes Outcomes For Racial-Ethnic Minorities, Jamillah Bowman Williams

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Research on the efficacy of organizational diversity efforts has yielded mixed results. It remains unclear when positive or negative outcomes should be expected, and why. This article fills a gap in the sociological literature by examining critical social psychological mechanisms. In Experiment 1, I found that common diversity messaging led to increased bias towards racial minorities. In Experiment 2, I examined how alternative framing may influence these outcomes. Findings revealed that the common “business case” emphasizing profit and performance gains made decision-makers less likely to select a Black job candidate than emphasizing civil rights law. I then examined social psychological …

A Taxonomy Of Silencing: The Law’S 100 Year Suppression Of The Tulsa Race Massacre, Suzette M. Malveaux

Publications

Over one hundred years have passed since the 1921 brutal massacre of Tulsa’s African American community. This notorious attack came at the hands of a white mob and with the government’s blessing. With numerous centennial commemorations behind us, what has been learned? The answer to this question is crucial to preventing similar atrocities in the future.

One lesson is how important it is to tell the story—to honor the voices of those who lived through one of the most infamous government-sanctioned racial attacks in U.S. history. Knowledge is power.

Another lesson is how pernicious the law can be in silencing …

Survival Voting And Minority Political Rights, Douglas M. Spencer, Lisa Grow Sun, Brigham Daniels, Chantel Sloan, Natalie Blades

Publications

The health of American democracy has literally been challenged. The global pandemic has powerfully exposed a long-standing truth: electoral policies that are frequently referred to as "convenience voting" are really a mode of "survival voting" for millions of Americans. As our data show, racial minorities are overrepresented among voters whose health is most vulnerable, and politicians have leveraged these health disparities to subordinate the political voice of racial minorities.

To date, data about racial disparities in health has played a very limited role in assessing voting rights. A new health lens on the racial impacts of voting rules would beneficially …

Debunking The Myth That Police Body Cams Are Civil Rights Tool, Scott Skinner-Thompson

Publications

No abstract provided.

Book Review, Justin Murray

Publications

No abstract provided.

Criminal Law Exceptionalism, Benjamin Levin

Publications

For over half a century, U.S. prison populations have ballooned and criminal codes have expanded. In recent years, a growing awareness of mass incarceration and the harms of criminal law across lines of race and class has led to a backlash of anti-carceral commentary and social movement energy. Academics and activists have adopted a critical posture, offering not only small-bore reforms, but full-fledged arguments for the abolition of prisons, police, and criminal legal institutions. Where criminal law was once embraced by commentators as a catchall solution to social problems, increasingly it is being rejected, or at least questioned. Instead of …

Antidiscrimination Law Through A Sociolegal Lens, Anna Offit

Faculty Publications

This Symposium invites reflection on whether the Anthropology of Law has “any space left for the content of rules” at a time when the concerns of legal anthropologists have largely shifted to processes, materials, and practices that are “adjacent to law.” Taking the jury system as an illustrative case, this Essay advocates for the relevance and value of the anthropological study of rules, their content, and their effects. Looking in particular at antidiscrimination rules derived from Batson v. Kentucky, decided in 1986, it argues that a sociolegal, ethnographic approach to how lawyers perpetuate discrimination in jury selection offers insight …

Submission To The Province Of Nova Scotia On Its Review Of The Intimate Images And Cyber-Protection Act - Leaf, Suzie Dunn, Rosel Kim

Reports & Public Policy Documents

The Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF) commends the Nova Scotia government for reviewing its Intimate Images and Cyber-protection Act (the Act) and seeking public input for this review. Nova Scotia has been, and continues to be, a leader in Canada for its role in advancing innovative laws and supports for people targeted by technology-facilitated violence (TFV), digital abuse, and the non-consensual distribution of intimate images (NCDII). As these forms of harmful behaviour evolve and become better understood, it is important to revisit this legislation to assess whether it is providing meaningful and accessible responses to such serious social …

This Is Not A Drill: The War Against Antiracist Teaching In America, Kimberlé W. Crenshaw

Faculty Scholarship

On January 5, 2022, Professor Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw received the 2021 Triennial Award for Lifetime Service to Legal Education and the Legal Profession from the Association of American Law Schools (AALS). In this modified acceptance speech delivered at the 2022 AALS Awards Ceremony, she reflects on the path that brought her to this moment and the crisis over antiracist and social justice education that is unfolding today. Arguing that the legal academy bears a collective responsibility to fight back against the silencing of antiracist frameworks, she calls on legal educational institutions to confront their historical agnosticism toward racial subordination and …

Cause For Concern Or Cause For Celebration?: Did Bostock V. Clayton County Establish A New Mixed Motive Theory For Title Vii Case And Make It Easier For Plaintiffs To Prove Discrimination Claims?, Terrence Cain

Seattle University Law Review

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 makes it unlawful for an employer to discriminate against an employee “because of” race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. This seems simple enough, but if an employer makes an adverse employment decision partly for an impermissible reason and partly for a permissible reason, i.e., if the employer acts with a mixed motive, has the employer acted “because of” the impermissible reason? According to Gross v. FBL Financial Services, Inc. and University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center v. Nassar, the answer is no. The Courts in Gross and Nassar held …

Hernández V. Mesa: A Case For A More Meaningful Partnership With The Inter-American Commission On Human Rights, Peyton Jacobsen

Seattle University Law Review

Through an in-depth examination of Hernández, the Inter-American Human Rights System, and the success of Mexico’s partnership with said system, this Note will make a case for embracing human rights bodies— specifically, the Inter-American System on Human Rights—as an appropriate and necessary check on the structures that form the United States government. Part I will look closely at the reasoning and judicially created doctrine that guided the decision in Hernández, with the goal of providing a better understanding of the complicated path through the courts that led to a seemingly straightforward yet unsatisfying result. Part II will illustrate the scope …

Mary Lou Graves, Nolen Breedlove, And The Nineteenth Amendment, Ellen D. Katz

Articles

This close examination of two cases is part of a larger ongoing project to provide a distinct account of the Nineteenth Amendment. In 1921, the Alabama Supreme Court held the Nineteenth Amendment required that any poll tax be imposed equally on men and women. Sixteen years later, the Supreme Court disagreed. Juxtaposing these two cases, and telling their story in rich context, captures my larger claim that—contrary to the general understanding in the scholarly literature—the Nineteenth Amendment was deliberately crafted as a highly circumscribed measure that would eliminate only the exclusively male franchise while serving steadfastly to preserve and promote …

Race In Washington’S Juvenile Legal System: 2021 Report To The Washington Supreme Court, Task Force 2.0 Juvenile Justice Subcommittee

Seattle University Law Review

Part I of this report provides the core work of the subcommittee and is intended to function as a stand-alone document, expressed in youth- friendly language, that sets forth: (1) the youth-articulated goals for systemic change to the juvenile legal system; (2) a narrative of how the system currently works and the harms caused; and (3) the change needed to bring about the youth-articulated goals for systemic change. This document is intended to be a youth-centered blueprint for change—a tool for community advocates, a framework for policy makers, and a call-in to the many institutional actors to center the leadership …

Modern Authorities From Brandies To Brnovich: For Jurists Who Have Considered Social Science / When Doctrine Was Not Enough, Jeremiah Chin

Articles

While the Supreme Court is the final authority on the Constitution, its interpretations increasingly turn to outside, non-legal sources to authoritatively support its conclusions of law and fact. Particularly in cases involving racial discrimination, the Court relies on social science data presented by the trial record, amicus curiae, or its own research. However, the Court lacks explicit rules or methods of analysis for these data. To remedy this gap in analysis, this article proposes a critical methodology for analyzing the use of social science data in cases involving race. By outlining a historiography of the Court's invocation of extrinsic data, …

Denial Of Housing To African Americans: Post-Slavery Reflections From A Civil Rights Advocate, Elaine Gross

Touro Law Review

In this article, I draw on two decades of experience as a civil rights advocate to reflect on the denial of housing to African Americans in post-slavery America. I do so as Founder and President of the civil rights organization, ERASE Racism. I undertake historical research and share insights from my own experience to create and reflect upon six lessons related to understanding the systematic discrimination and segregation of African Americans. The lessons encompass: (1) the role of the federal government, (2) the role of municipal governments, (3) White supremacy ideation and actions, (4) legislative advocacy and legal actions, (5) …

Returning Home And Restoring Trust: A Legal Framework For Federally Non- Recognized Tribal Nations To Acquire Ancestral Lands In Fee Simple, Taino J. Palermo

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Resisting Indigenous Erasure In Rhode Island: The Need For Compulsory Native American History In Rhode Island Schools, Whitney Saunders

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Changemakers: Master Of Studies In Law: 'Radical Imagination, Radical Listening', Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.